Angels with Dirty Faces: Three Stories of Crime, Prison, and Redemption

by Walidah Imarisha

Paperback, 2016

Status

Available

Genres

General Nonfiction

Biography

Biography & Memoir

Politics, Government, Law and Public Policy

Nonfiction

Publication

AK Press (2016), 320 pages

Description

The three lives in this creative nonfiction account are united by the presence of actual harm--sometimes horrific violence. Imarisha, dealing with the complexities of her own experience with sexual assault and accountability, brings us behind prison walls to visit her adopted brother Kakamia and his fellow inmate Jimmy "Mac" McElroy, a member of the brutal Irish gang the Westies. Together they explore the questions: People can do unimaginable things to one another--and then what? What do we as a society do? What might redemption look like? Imarisha doesn't flinch as she guides us through the difficulties and contradictions, eschewing theory for a much messier reality. The result is a nuanced and deeply personal analysis that connects readers emotionally with the lives of people caught up within, and often destroyed by, our criminal justice system.--Publisher… (more)

User reviews

LibraryThing member ShawIslandLibrary

Walidah Imarisha is remarkable. This book, which began as her MFA thesis, has been described as "creative nonfiction", and Imarisha herself says, "Any nonfiction book must be read partially as fiction, for we all tell ourselves stories to make sense of our lives." "Angels With Dirty Faces" tells

three stories, two of them focusing on men who served or are serving prison sentences, the other the story of the person who is bringing their stories out from behind the prison bars (Imarisha). If you are concerned about prison and criminal justice reform, if you are concerned about sexual assault, if you are interested in the potential for transformative justice, or are ready to expand your sense of compassion, this book will provide you with joy, pain, enlightenment, anger, and poetry (Imarisha: "Facts are not poetic enough to reveal the rhythm of a human heart. We thank poetry for its inaccuracies—imperfect cracks on the face of beauty through which the light is able to shine through—word to poet Leonard Cohen."). Word to poet, activist, teacher, visionary fiction writer, and inspirational human being Walidah Imarisha.

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LibraryThing member eldang

An unavoidably difficult, frustrating book, given the subject matter. I appreciated Imarisha's honesty, including about the number of the things she doesn't have satisfying answers to because no-one does.

LibraryThing member eldang

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